From: Alan Hultberg (alan.hultberg@truth.biola.edu)
Date: Fri Jul 06 2001 - 17:12:11 EDT
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Iver Larsen wrote:
>
>This is the text:
>> Jas 2:1 --
>> ADELFOI MOU, MH EN PROSWPOLHMYIAIS ECETE THN PISTIN TOU KURIOU hMWN
>> IHSOU CRISTOU THS DOXHS.
>
>It is hard to give a brief translation into English of the circumstantial,
>emphatic prepositional phrase EN PROSWPOLHMYIAIS. It almost has to come out
>as a dependent clause, and the noun itself is complex. Partiality or
>favoritism does not quite cover it, I think. Let me try:
>
>My brothers, if you treat people according to outward appearance or status,
>you don't have the faith of our glorious Lord, Jesus Christ, do you?
>
>(I am using "having faith" because a few verses down (2:14-18) James is
>saying that claiming to "have faith" without corresponding action is in fact
>a denial of that very faith.)
>
>Is this not a possible understanding of the grammar of this verse? Is there
>any other possible grammatical analysis?
>
Iver,
Your understanding of the grammar is certainly acceptable, though
James could equally be understood to be stating a prohibition (taking
ECETE as imperative rather than indicative), unless I missed
something in your opening analysis. A quick Accordance search yields
hundreds of examples of clause initial MH negating imperatives.
Glancing quickly at the data, Rom 14:15, 20 seem to me to be exact
parallels to James 2:1.
I haven't looked, but I'm sure that this is how most translators have
understood the grammar.
Yours,
Alan Hultberg
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